


Who Was He?

by GE72



Category: Law & Order
Genre: Gen, Newspaper story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-27
Updated: 2017-06-27
Packaged: 2018-11-19 15:17:36
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 688
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11316096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GE72/pseuds/GE72
Summary: A newspaper story about the events in the season 14 episode "Nowhere Man."





	Who Was He?

From the New York Post  
March 31, 2004

Who was Daniel Tenofsky? Who was Jacob Deiter?

Those are the two questions that have remained unanswered after the murder case of Tenofsky, a New York County prosecutor who worked in the appellate bureau, was wrapped up with the confession of criminal defense attorney William Wachtler.

Wachtler, an attorney from Brooklyn, confessed to the murder of Tenofsky and has been sentenced to 25 years to life in prison on a charge of second degree murder. The murder stemmed from another murder case that Tenofsky worked on ten years ago as a lead prosecutor. Tenfosky had threatened to come forward that Wachtler had suppressed evidence in that murder case, in which a newspaper loading dock worker, Bobby Parentti, was killed by Anthony Biscotti and Frederico Libretti, on orders allegedly from organized crime boss Franco Tortomassi.

At a press conference heralding the conviction, New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg, standing alongside district attorney Arthur Branch and executive district attorney Jack McCoy, said the conviction “was a triumph of justice.”

Tenofsky was found murdered in February in Central Park. During the initial investigation by New York City police detectives Lennie Briscoe and Ed Green, they discovered that Tenfosky was actually Jacob Deiter, a 47-year old from Phoenix, Arizona. Deiter had no known law degree from any law school in the country.

“I don’t know who Jacob Deiter was,” McCoy told reporters at the press conference, “but Dan Tenofsky, the one I knew, was one hell of a lawyer.”

Deiter had taken the identity of Daniel Tenofskie, now a 48-year old longshoreman from the Bronx. Tenofskie actually attended Brooklyn Law School in 1977, but dropped out after one year. It was from that year that Deiter took Tenofskie’s identity, changed the spelling of the surname, and became Daniel Tenofsky, attorney at law and who eventually was hired by the district attorney’s office. 

Though the victim of identity theft, Daniel Tenofskie has had no problems with his life in regards to his finances or any case of mistaken identity.

As Tenfosky, Deiter successfully prosecuted criminal cases under former District Attorney Adam Schiff, until the Parentti case came to him. Wachtler, who represented the defendants, Biscotti and Libretti, realized this Dan Tenofsky was not the Dan Tenofskie that he had known while attending Brooklyn Law School. Wachtler had threatened Tenofsky with exposure unless the charges were dropped against his clients. Tenofsky had the charges dropped and transferred to the appellate bureau of the DA’s office, so not to risk a case of potential exposure.

After his death and discovery of his true identity, the New York state superior court authorized that all of Tenofsky’s cases be reviewed under scrutiny to determine their validity if brought to appeals. It was during the reviews by McCoy and Serena Southerlyn, that the district attorney’s office discovered the file on the Parentti case had been stripped of evidence logs and eyewitness testimonies, most likely by Tenofsky himself, to prevent his exposure.

A second investigation into the Parentti case revealed the location of his body, buried under a freeway overpass foundation, through a construction order for concrete; it was still in the file that had been stripped by Tenfosky. The body was buried there by Biscotti and Labretti, who were working for a construction outfit at the time. 

Both men claimed to have committed the murder under orders from Tortomassi, a claim that has since been disproved.

Wachtler had ordered the murder of Tenofsky, who threatened to reveal Wachtler’s role in the murder of Parentti in trying to pin it on Tortomassi.

Biscotti and Labretti have confessed to their roles in the murder of Dan Tenofsky, and are serving sentences for murder.

Police in Phoenix, Arizona, are still searching for any member of Deiter’s family. A co-worker in the appellate bureau told investigators that Deiter, as Tenofsky, mentioned that he had a brother.

When asked about Deiter’s family, McCoy replied, “Who knows if he really did have a brother or even a family? Maybe they were all just props for all of us to see. Maybe none of it was real.”


End file.
